


Compatability - ABANDONED

by orphan_account



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Cuddling, Flashbacks, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Kissing Lessons, M/M, Nightmares, Oral Sex, PTSD, Recovery, Relationship Growth, UST, lots of talking, post-movie scenes, talk of death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2016-02-26
Packaged: 2018-05-08 13:31:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5498834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finn is recovering, slowly, and Poe isn't sleeping all that well post Starkiller-base mission. They manage to keep each other company.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

There was a crackle, and then silence. Voices of friends – closer to family – vanishing forever. The scream of TIE fighters. Blasts of weaponfire. On far too many nights Poe found himself lying in bed drenched in sweat reliving the suicide assault on Starkiller Base over and over again, pushing it aside only to find himself staring down the black mask of Kylo Ren, feeling his very mind being torn into. When he couldn't take that anymore, Poe put on his jacket and went for a walk.

Sleep was overrated anyway.

He was finishing a lap around General Organa's D'Qar compound, the night air cold and crisp, when he came across Finn outside the medical bay for the first time. As far as Poe knew, Finn wasn't supposed to be walking around unsupervised yet. Finn was, in fact, leaning pretty heavily against the wall as he walked.

"What are you doing up?" Poe asked, grinning as Finn jumped and then relaxed to smile back at him. Whatever the First Order had tried to do to Finn they hadn't managed to dim that beautiful smile, and Poe could only thank whatever lucky stars for that.

"Patrolling the perimeter, you know..." Finn said, gesturing vaguely. "Keeping guard. Building my strength back up."

"You can't sleep either."

"I can't sleep either," Finn admitted.

"Well, come on then." Poe slung Finn's arm over his shoulders, and got his own around Finn's solid waist. "Two sets of eyes are better than one on a patrol anyway, right?"

Finn leaned heavily against Poe, fingertips digging into Poe's shoulder. "Right," he agreed, and let Poe lead them on. Finn was warm against his side, radiating heat into the cold air, but in a way that felt healthy rather than feverish. Poe would definitely have taken Finn right back to the medical bay otherwise. Poe tended to run hot himself, but the feel of Finn's heat against him was more than welcome. Here was someone who was still alive – though that had been touch-and-go for a while.

Poe kept the pace easy, stopping them to rest here and there. Finn hadn't gotten to see much of the compound yet, so Poe gave him a stripped down version of the grand tour. It was a good way to spend a few hours, and Poe finished it up with his favorite part of this base, set a little below one of the watchtowers but still with a great view.

Finn seemed tired by the time they reached the bench. They sat together in companionable silence, leaning into each other for warmth as they watched the fading starlight. Finn's steady breaths were grounding, and Poe found himself matching their cadence. He might be able to drift off right here for a cat-nap.

"I feel like they're right behind me," Finn said, quietly. It might not have woken Poe up if he'd fallen asleep, but he was still awake enough to hear. He pressed into Finn's side just a little harder to let him know he was listening. "The Order. I feel like any second I'm going to hear Captain Phasma barking 'FN-2187 who gave you permission to take off your helmet'. Send me back to retraining."

"They're not getting you back, Finn," Poe promised, even though he knew the words were empty. He couldn't even keep _himself_ out of their clutches. Finn was in as much danger as any other rebellion fighter.

"Yeah," Finn agreed. They fell back into silence for a while, broken only when Finn laughed.

"Hm?" Poe asked.

"I shoved her down a garbage chute after I made her take the shields done. If she was behind me after that, I'd already be dead."

"That's not very comforting," Poe protested.

Finn pushed harder into Poe's side for a moment. "It is a little." His voice was almost to quiet to hear.

Poe didn't even know how to answer that, other than to despise the First Order even more for what they'd done to Finn. "I haven't been sleeping real well," Poe said. A confidence deserved a confidence, didn't it? "I've lost fighters before, of course, but it's always hard losing friends. Hearing their radios go silent behind me, that's the worst feeling."

"I had a friend." Finn said, after a while. "FN-2003. We got paired together for patrols and bunking. We weren't supposed to, but we looked out for each other. Jakku was our first mission. He didn't make it."

Poe felt his throat go thick. Stormtroopers weren't supposed to have friends, to have relationships and care about each other and be _people_. They were just Stormtroopers, irredeemable killers. Or so he'd thought, until he met Finn.

"It could have been me," Poe said. "I might have been the one who... who shot him."

"I know," Finn looked out at the pale pink horizon, the sun beginning to rise over the curve of the planet. "But if he lived... I might not have run. Freed you. Met Rey, joined the Rebellion, destroyed Starkiller Base. Put Captain Phasma down a garbage chute."

"Those are all good things." Poe said.

"Yeah," Finn agreed, giving Poe just a corner of that smile that was almost as bright as the sunrise itself. "I'm still pretty pleased about that last one."

Poe laughed, and Finn with him, and they looked back toward the brightening horizon. The sky lit with brighter pinks and oranges, reds and golds, and the disk of the sun rose to wash them both in daylight.

"I've never done this before," Finn said. He practically glowed, deep brown skin answering the golden morning light with copper and bronze and his endlessly deep eyes lit as warm and molten as a star – their gravity just as strong. Poe felt his heart skip a beat. "Just sitting and watching a sunrise. It's nice."

He was so close. Poe almost thought Finn was going to lean in, bridge the distance and kiss him. Poe was not even the tiniest bit opposed to that possibility, but after slightly too long a pause it seemed that Finn wasn't going to after all.

Poe put his hand over Finn's instead, twined their fingers together to give it a squeeze, and Finn squeezed back.

"You're doing all kinds of new things," Poe said. "But let's get you back to the Medical Bay before they send out a search party for you."

"Alright," Finn agreed, slinging his arm back around Poe's shoulders to walk slowly back where he belonged.


	2. Chapter 2

Maybe one of the only good things the First Order ever did was make sure their Storm Troopers were strong and healthy – physically, at least. Once Finn was up and about again, he recovered quickly. Poe saw him everywhere around the base, even if he was still staying in the Medical Bay until the medical droids were sure he was completely healed. Finn was often found training in the gym to get his strength and endurance back, in the mess hall unwittingly charming the cooks with his smile and honest praise of the food, or training in the practice ranges with any kind of weapon he could get his hands on. Finn was _good_ , an excellent marksman with any kind of blaster they could hand him.

It was almost a competition on the base, seeing how many shots it took for Finn to hit a moving bullseye every time with a new weapon. The Rebels had their standard weapons, but more than a few scraps and odd pieces gathered from species all over the galaxy. It never took Finn more than a minute to figure out even the strangest blaster they could scrounge out of the weapon stores.

When they ran out of new handheld weapons to try on Finn, Jessika took him into one of the X-wing flight simulators as her gunner, setting it to one of the most hellishly difficult programs. They came back out sweaty and laughing with their arms around each other's back, having very nearly completed it before exploding. Even Poe didn't always manage to finish that program – it was astonishing for a first try.

"Look at these scores!" Snap crowed, going through the numbers. "Since when can stormtroopers _shoot_ like this?"

Poe tensed, Finn _wasn't_ a stormtrooper. He'd nearly died to prove that, and proved himself again at Starkiller Base. It wasn't fair to treat him like a stormtrooper, but Finn just smiled back at Snap.

"Most can't. I was the best in my squad. They had... hah," Finn snorted slightly, shaking his head. "They had such high hopes for me."

"We're damn lucky you chose our side," Poe said, completely heartfelt, clapping Finn on the back. "You're way too good for the likes of them."

Finn blushed a bit at that – Poe had figured out his tells – the way he ducked a bit, the particular way his eyes crinkled in a smile, the way he glanced at Poe out the corner of his eye. Finn wrapped his arm around Poe's waist to squeeze him back, but no more than that.

It stayed casually friendly, no matter how much Poe might want something a bit warmer than that.

Finn just seemed to like physical contact. He was always reaching out to hug, to hold hands, to lean against someone – once he figured out they liked that.

"The First Order discouraged casual touch." Finn confessed one game night, when Snap Wexley was trouncing them all at Galactic Expansion. Finn was cuddled on the couch between Poe and Jessika's girlfriend Lyn on the other side, and leaned his head on Poe's shoulder. "This is so _nice_."

"Yeah," Poe agreed. He couldn't imagine a life without touch – sterile and soul-crushingly lonely. He gave Finn's hand a squeeze, holding him closer.

Thankfully Jessika took matters into her own hands, because Poe didn't know what to say. She crawled over Lyn to give Finn a big smacking kiss to the cheek and a hug.

"You can cuddle with any of us whenever you like," Jessika promised. "We like you."

Poe wasn't the only one agreeing with that. All the pilots and mechanics in the games group liked Finn. Poe could feel the tremble in Finn's inhale, feel how close to tears he was. Lyn on the other side of him must have felt the same thing.

"Yeah," Lyn agreed, bumping her shoulder into him as she finished her turn, "You're warm and your hands don't wander. I am not above stealing your body heat... now if you'd sign that non-aggression treaty with Jess and I..."

"Hah, no chance!" Finn came back from the edge, drawn back out into the game where he was systematically consolidating systems in his corner of the Galactic Expansion board. Poe put his arm around Finn when he leaned back again, cupped the healed back of his head and was just glad Finn was never going to have to be alone like that again.

 

Finn healed well and quickly, but he wasn't always up to training or moving around all that much. He kept himself busy even when the medical droids insisted that he spend time resting. BB-8 loved him, and Finn took to studying astromech so they could actually talk. He picked up the basic phrases fast.

Their favorite topic of conversation, predictably enough, was Rey. Poe wished he'd gotten to meet her more than just in passing. Anyone Finn and BB-8 and even General Organa liked so much _had_ to be great.

Finn though, he was _smart_. Poe couldn't imagine the First Order valued intelligence in their cannon fodder, but Finn always was exceptional. He'd absorbed the information around him like a sponge, he just hadn't swallowed the indoctrination. Finn could remember the obscurest things about the ships and bases he'd been on, their strengths and weaknesses, the details of every tactical maneuver he'd ever been taught, and he was more than willing to recall them for the Resistance. Finn attended more than a few meetings with the Generals, giving them all the information he could.

It wasn't easy on him, taking himself back to remember what his life had been like as a stormtrooper. Finn got shaky afterward, a lot of the time, jumping at shadows. Poe tried to be there for him, to ground him, just like being around Finn helped Poe with his nightmares.

Poe couldn't always be there, though. Even with the map found and Rey off finding Luke Skywalker, there were still missions to fly. Nothing big, mostly recognizance in the wake of Starkiller's attack, but a few small skirmishes. Even with new nightmares of Kylo Ren, Poe was still the best pilot in the Galaxy. It didn't affect his performance, and he flew with new and old members of his team where he was needed.

Poe was off on a routine mission when Finn was asked to give information on stormtrooper training and conditioning, from childhood on up. It might help them develop better tactics to counter the First Order, but it was rough on Finn to ask him to remember that. Some uncharitable part of Poe wondered if they'd waited until he was out to do it, just to make sure he didn't interfere, before he dismissed it. General Organa trusted him more than that.

When Poe heard where Finn was he, skipped his after-flight shower and went directly to the council room with BB-8 beeping nervously on his heels. General Organa looked up sharply, worried he had urgent news, but turned back to Finn when Poe shook his head.

Finn was standing at parade rest, wearing a new jacket to replace the lightsabered one. It didn't fit him as nice as Poe's old one had. He was describing discipline and endurance training, and it took Poe a minute to realize it was children Finn was describing. Hardly more than toddlers. Poe couldn't be the only one who could tell that Finn's hands were shaking behind his back as he described withheld food, rest, or other _basic needs_ and other disproportionate punishment for tiny infractions. They must be able to see it, but nobody stopped Finn from continuing his recitation.

Poe couldn't push his way through the gathered Generals and Admirals to stand with Finn, touch him and make sure he was alright, but he could leave BB-8 at the door and edge around the back of the room until he was within Finn's line of sight. Finn's eyes focused on him all the way across the room, and maybe it was wishful thinking on Poe's part but the thought he saw a little of the tightness in Finn's shoulders and lips ease. Poe kept working his way around the room, to get as close to Finn as he could without disturbing any of the listening Generals.

Finn turned slightly, as if to follow Poe with his eyes, before he snapped his attention back to front and continued his recitation.

"I'm sorry..." Finn ended, a light dew of sweat gleaming on his forehead. "I don't remember much before that."

"Thank you, Finn." General Organa said, giving him an encouraging smile. "You have given us more than we could have dreamed."

The formality of the meeting broke then, with people talking and conjecturing with each other, and Poe finally stepped through to Finn's side. Poe touched Finn's shoulder, gently, and Finn trembled through before he unbent just a little from parade rest. He squeezed Poe's hand hard, but let it go when one of the Admirals asked a question.

Thankfully the questioning didn't last long, and then the meeting was adjourned. Poe slung a casual arm around Finn to lead him out. Finn's arm came around Poe's shoulders too. It would look easy and casual, but Finn's hand was gripping Poe's shoulder so hard it almost hurt. BB-8 followed, beeping concernedly.

"You all right?" Poe asked, as soon as they were out of sight of anyone else.

Finn shook his head and shoved Poe against the nearest wall, following to crowd him in, clinging to him tight. Poe _really_ didn't mind getting shoved against the wall by Finn, he just wished it wasn't because Finn was hurting. He held Finn as close as he could, stroked the tense arc of his back, scratched gently at the short curls at the back of his neck.

"You're not there anymore, Finn," Poe reassured him. "You got out, and you got me out. You're Rebel scum now, and you know what they say about scum. It floats to the top. We're cream of the crop, you and I."

Finn actually laughed at the old joke. Maybe he'd never heard it before. It was a little bit shaky, but it was still a laugh. Poe would take it. Finn was relaxing a little, cuddling in closer. BB-8 noticed that and booped in relief.

"You know... you don't have to do it," Poe told Finn. "You don't have relive that shit just to give them information, when they ask. You're still one of ours if you say no."

Finn nuzzled his face into Poe's neck. "I know, but... I do. This is the side you and Rey are on. BB-8, Jess and Lyn and Snap, General Organa, Chewie and... and Han." Finn faltered a little on Han's name, and Poe felt that twinge of sorrow too. "Everyone I care about's on this side, and you're the only side going against the First Order. If I can help, I need to do it. I _want_ to help."

"You're a good man." The more Poe got to know him, the better a man he turned out to be. Finn was just _good_ , and none of the awful things the First Order had done had been able to take that from him. In an entire lifetime, they'd never broken him.

Much as he'd like to think he was _that_ incorruptible, Poe wasn't sure he was. He was the son his parents had raised him to be, a member of the Resistance and a pilot just like his mother, absolutely loyal to General Organa. He'd been raised with love and Finn with cruelty. If their positions were reversed, Poe had no doubt Finn would still be a good person. He just wasn't sure he would be himself.

Finn had relaxed more, warm and close rather than tense and trembling now. "You smell good," he murmured, pushing his face deeper into Poe's neck. His hand was warm on the small of Poe's back, pulling their bodies flush together, and Poe's breath caught. It felt too damn good, felt like exactly what he wanted. It wasn't like the innocent platonic contact they'd shared before, but for all Poe knew Finn had never had sex in his life. It didn't seem like the kind of thing the First Order would encourage among the troops.

"I smell like the inside of a flight suit," Poe protested, and his voice was almost even. It almost didn't tremble. His body almost didn't arch up against Finn's, his nails digging in just a little at the back of Finn's neck.

"Mmm," Finn answered, rubbing his face against Poe's neck as if he wanted to get the smell of it all over him. Then Finn's soft lips found the side of Poe's neck, sucking a line of kisses up the side of it, and Poe gave up entirely and melted. He whimpered, stretching his neck out to the side to give Finn as much space to kiss as possible. BB-8 whistled cheekily and rolled off, making themself scarce. They'd learned when to give Poe space pretty early in their partnership.

"You want to find a quiet corner and..." Finn suggested, reaching Poe's ear and sucking the lobe into the heat of his mouth. He flicked it with his tongue, and Poe just about forgot how words functioned.

Poe's first attempt at an answer was absolutely garbled and ended on a groan, but on his second try with Finn chuckling at him, he managed, "How about my quarters instead?"

Finn pulled back slightly, and Poe could be forgiven for the intense feeling of _loss_ at that. "It's unmonitored?" Finn asked.

"What?" Poe's mind reeled. But of course. Of course they would have monitored the stormtroopers sleeping quarters, too. No moment ever out from under a watchful eye. It turned his stomach, but there were better things to think about. "It's unmonitored. Pretty much everything but the base entrances and main hallways are unmonitored. Come on."

Finn grinned at him, and Poe just about forgot about quarters at all and grabbed him to kiss him senseless before Finn turned to pull him along the corridor toward the barracks, holding his hand tight.

Poe sure as hell wasn't letting go.

Finn slowed when they reached the living quarters, and Poe took the lead to his own room in the officer's hallway. Past doorways that had seen good people come and go. Too many. Poe had lived in his room long enough for it to gather a clutter of belongings, and he'd turned the bottom bunk into extra storage space, but he still kept it pretty clean and organized. Never knew when they'd have to pack up and move base.

...never knew when he wouldn't make it back from a mission. Better not to leave too much stuff behind for someone else to deal with, send them to Yavin 4 to what was left of his family.

Poe didn't have much time for morose thoughts. Finn's eyes swept his room once, categorizing it, then shut the door behind them and pushed Poe back against the ladder of the bunk bed. He kissed Poe's neck, one side and then the other with his whole body pressed against Poe's, then dropped to his knees in front of him.

"Can I?" Finn asked, stroking Poe's cock through his pants, looking up at him as though he really did wonder if he was going to get a 'yes'.

"Oh yeah." Poe might never have undone his belt so fast in his life. He launched it in an unmanned flight across the room, not knowing or caring where it was going to end up, and Finn had already unzipped him and fished his cock out. It was lagging behind the rest of Poe, only about half hard, but the sure warmth of Finn's hand had it perking right up.

It turned out Finn's grin was even more lethal from above, the way he looked up at Poe as though _he'd_ been the one given a gift with his deep eyes so warm. Then Finn wrapped his soft lips around Poe's cock and sucked every last thought out of him. He was neat about it, bobbing quick and efficient in time with his stroking hand, the way he moved when he was in the zone with a good blaster rifle, but set to a far more pleasurable task.

Finn blew Poe in absolute silence, but that was fine. Poe was definitely moaning enough for both of them.

"Oh Finn, yeah just like that... fuck." Poe stroked the tight curls of Finn's hair, his cheek, his shoulders. Anything he could touch. Finn's mouth was perfect, hot and wet with his tongue curling around Poe's cock and flicking at his sensitive frenulum with each quick bob.

There was no way Poe could last against that. He whined high in his throat, the wave of pleasure washing over him, and broke off with a deep groan when he came. Finn sucked him dry and sat back with a satisfied smirk, licking his lips. And to think just minutes before Poe hadn't thought he'd had sex before. Poe halfheartedly tucked his cock back into his boxers as he let his shaky knees drop him to the floor with Finn. He ended up halfway in Finn's lap, with Finn's arm around him to support him, and his face against Finn's neck. It was a great place to be.

Finn was hard already, undoing his own belt one-handed to get his cock out, and Poe gladly took it over for him. It was a nice cock, skin so velvet soft sliding over the hard heat of it in Poe's hand. Finn's entire body tensed when Poe started stroking it, breath coming in sharp little silent gasps through his nose. His arms were around Poe, holding him tight. His body hardly moved, hardly reacted, and his eyes were almost desperate when Poe looked up to meet them.

"Is this good?" Poe asked, slowing his hand. Some people got really still and quiet when they were having a good time, but in his experience most people reacted at least a little.

Finn nodded, gasping in another little breath, a fine tremble passing through him. Poe didn't speed up his hand. He stroked Finn's cock nice and slow, running his thumb around the crown with each pass. Finn licked his lips again, endlessly deep eyes pulling Poe in, and Poe gave in to gravity and finally kissed him. His lips were every bit as soft and warm as Poe had dreamed, the flavor of his own come still on them.

He must be on a hair trigger, because Finn stopped breathing entirely and came right then. His body hardly moved, beyond the pulsing of his cock in Poe's hand. Luckily Poe's laundry was within reach, to wipe the semen off his hand on a dirty shirt while Finn remembered what breathing was.

Finn recovered fast too. He was cupping the side of Poe's face, turning it back toward himself almost before Poe was done wiping his hand off. His eyes flicked to Poe's mouth and back up as he leaned forward, and Poe was more than willing to kiss him again. Finn was hesitant at first, but he warmed to it quickly. They traded sweet little kisses, just playing with their lips and not bringing teeth or tongues into it. Not yet.

"This was _good_ ," Finn said, drawing back just a little to let Poe up.

Poe laughed as he stood. It wasn't particularly _great sex_ , it wasn't anything fancy and it hadn't lasted long, but it sure did hit the spot after watching and wanting Finn for so long.

He offered Finn a hand up too. "We didn't even make it to the bed... but we can fix that now if you want to cuddle?"

Finn's eyebrows raised in surprise, but then he grinned. He always was a glutton for cuddling, maybe even more than Poe was. "Yeah," he agreed.

Poe didn't waste any time crawling up into his bunk and pulling Finn in with him. Lying with their legs tangled up together and their arms around each other was much more comfortable than slumped on the floor.

"I've never done this before," Finn confessed, kissing Poe again.

"What, kissing?" Poe asked, after a beat of confusion. "Because if you say you've never given head before you're a dirty liar."

"Kissing," Finn confirmed. "At least, not on the mouth? I think I like it."

That was just sad, but Poe was diplomatic enough not to say that out loud. "You're a natural," he said instead. He wouldn't have guessed Finn hadn't kissed before.

Finn grinned and kissed him again. "Giving head, is that what you call..." he glanced down toward Poe's groin.

"Sucking cock, yeah." Poe said. "Giving head, going down, a blow job. If you use your hands that's a hand job or jacking off."

Finn nodded, mouthing the sounds of the words, and Poe had a feeling it was all being categorized in his sharp mind to be kept forever. "Blow job, though? Why would you call it that? You don't _blow_."

Poe shrugged and kissed him again. He used a little tongue this time, and Finn opened right up to let him before he chased Poe's tongue back into his mouth to try it himself. Poe moaned encouragingly, sucking on his tongue. Finn was a little breathless when they broke apart again.

"What would _you_ call it?" Poe asked.

"Lots of things," Finn said, after gathering his thoughts for a second. "You'd just agree to meet in one of the surveillance dead zones, or misuse codes for other things. Like, ah... GPCI? Groin Plate Catch Inspection. Or R27, that's the code for a rifle test. A 'hand job' would be a manual pump priming."

Poe laughed aloud, and Finn blushed. Poe kissed the warmth of it from his cheeks. "It's ridiculous in any slang or language, but whatever you call it, it's a lot of fun."

Finn nodded to agree and kissed him again. There was nothing Poe had to do but practice kissing with Finn, _finally_ touch and cuddle the way he'd wanted. They got warm in their clothes and stripped out to be skin against skin, body against body. When Finn's shorter refractory period was over and he got up again, Poe was more than willing to prove that while he was famous as a pilot, he knew his way around any weapon. His 'rifle test' left nothing to be desired, and Finn falling asleep in his bed. Poe liked having him there.

 

Eventually the medical droids and doctors couldn't find any more excuses to keep Finn in the Medical Bay, and Poe offered to move him into his own room. He had two bunks in his room after all, and he didn't want to be alone in it any more than Finn wanted to be alone in a more communal bunkroom.

Not that they used both bunks. They were happy enough leaving the bottom bunk as an extra shelf and seating area and sleeping together in the top bunk.

Sharing the space was nice. Finn kept his stuff neat and organized. His warmth and steady breaths beside Poe in the bed was great. It made actually _sleeping_ there an awful lot easier. He didn't get stuck in his own head in the dark hours of the night so much, with Finn there to ground him.

The best part was waking up within arms reach, close enough to kiss and cuddle and have a morning tumble if they had time and were in the mood.


	3. Nightmares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe and Finn both have their nightmares, but being together can help.

Featureless gray walls.

The stomp of featureless white-armored stormtroopers.

A black mask, a black gloved hand twisting in front of his face.

It wasn't torture. There had been torture. Poe could _understand_ torture. Not this. Not having the very fibers of his mind torn into.

There was never going to be backup when he was caught. Poe knew he was going to die when the First Order were done with him. He'd known that. He could understand dying. Not this.

No one ever, _ever_ should have been able to tear through him like that and there was _nothing_ he could do. He couldn't fight it. He couldn't.

Poe bit his lip hard, trying to force air into his straining lungs. He wasn't there. He was in his own bunk, in his own room. He wasn't _there_ , but he was. Staring down that hand as he was split open and torn inside out.

His hands clenched on the blanket, trying to pay attention to the texture to ground himself. Nothing else in the galaxy had the same fluffy and slightly itchy feel of a Resistance-issue blanket. There was nowhere else Poe could be than on a Resistance base, feeling that. He was in his own bed, in his own bunk. Safe. As safe as any member of the Resistance could be.

Poe was here and not there, but he was staring down that hand as it _twisted_ and his mind shredded in fire. His entire body was drenched with sweat, sticking him to the thin sheets as he tried to breathe.

Poe's entire body flinched when a warm hand landed on his chest, but that hand didn't bring pain. It was gentle, lightly stroking his chest, wandering to his arms, his neck, his cheek. Finn's hand. It was accompanied by soft whispering, quiet and soothing, and Poe breathed.

He was here, where he was as safe as any Resistance pilot could be, with Finn. This affection and closeness didn't belong on a First Order ship. Hot tears stung at the corner of Poe's eyes as he fought away from Kylo Ren's invasion and toward Finn and safety.

"Shh," Finn whispered, when Poe could finally begin to understand his words. "Shh, they'll hear you, try to breath. Shh."

Finn's hand was shaking.

They. The faceless 'they' of the First Order Finn was so often afraid were right behind him. Finn was flashing back to that awful life, where nightmares were punished. Where he would be punished for trying to help, and trying to help anyway.

And Poe had triggered it with his own flashback.

"Fuck!" Poe flung the blanket off them and sat up in an explosive motion, shouting the crude expletive at the top of his lungs. The room's lighting flickered on, responding to sound and motion. Finn flinched, and Poe wrapped both arms around him, held him tight. "We're not there," he said, as much for his own benefit as for Finn's.

"Shut up Dameron, we're not interested!" Lyn called out from Jess' room.

"If you insist, Black Leader," Wexley called from his own room across the hall.

"In your dreams, Snap!" Poe threw back, and heard Wexley and a few others in nearby rooms laugh – along with other people warning everyone to shut up and sleep.

Finn was laughing too, a little watery and shaky, but way better than flashing back to the First Order.

"We're here," Poe said, quiet again, just to Finn. The lights dimmed. "We're with friends. We're safe. We got out of there."

"You got me out," Finn said.

"You got _me_ out," Poe echoed. Finn had been there when Poe didn't have any hope, going against everything he'd been trained to be because he couldn't bear what the First Order wanted him to be. An unexpected move that had been both of their salvation.

"We're never going back," Finn said, reaching down to pull the blanket back over them as the lights continued to fade.

"Damn right," Poe agreed. He held Finn close and breathed, focusing just on this closeness. Warm skin and quiet breaths and Finn's arms around him.

"I thought..." Finn murmured against Poe's collarbone. "I mean, I knew it wasn't going to happen, but I thought they were going to send you to reconditioning. Not supposed to think enough to have bad dreams, I guess."

Poe whimpered softly, pulling Finn closer. He pressed kisses to Finn's brow, stroked his back. "Never going to happen," he reminded. Finn nodded against his neck. Poe could have left it at that, he could have let them fall back asleep together without saying a word.

"Kylo Ren," he said instead. He couldn't make any words beyond that, but Finn seemed to understand. Maybe he, more than anyone, new what Ren was capable of.

"He's _never_ getting his hands on you again!" Finn promised. It sounded like the birth of galaxies, like he'd burn out stars with the strength of his conviction to make it true. He cupped the side of Poe's face. "Never," he repeated, softer, like it broke his heart.

Finn's lips were soft against Poe's, and Poe was more willing to lose himself in that closeness and reassurance until they both could sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> After several weeks, my desire to set this fic adrift has not lessened.
> 
> may all those who read fics and do not comment step on a lego


End file.
